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Climate Change Set To Cost Regional Communities

A new report confirms the staggering cost of climate change for regional and rural communities, including a likely hit to property values and reduced agricultural output.

It estimates the increasing frequency of droughts could wipe 1% off Australia's GDP each year, with industries including wheat, cotton, rice and dairy likely to be hit hard.

The Climate Council's Professor Will Steffen says the costs of climate change will continue to mount unless we do more to drive down emissions.

“Climate change will hit regional communities particularly hard because of the impacts of agricultural productivity, in fact, by 2030 about 19 billion dollars could be lost due to loss of agriculture and labor productivities.”

“Some of the properties that are most at risk from climate change are those along the Australian coastline, and this is because sea levels are rising and their rising at and increasing rate and that increase the risk of coastal inundation.” said Professor Steffen.